Roles of mothers in Disney media: Difference between revisions
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:*[[Dumbo]]- Jumbo. |
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:*[[One Hundred and One Dalmatians]]- Perdita. |
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:*[[Tarzan]]- Kala |
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:*[[The Princess and the Frog]]- Eudora. |
:*[[The Princess and the Frog]]- Eudora. |
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Revision as of 20:09, 14 January 2010
 | This article possibly contains original research. (March 2009) |
Template:Unencyclopedic The heroes and heroines of most Disney movies come from unstable family backgrounds;[1] most are either orphaned or have no mothers.[2] Few, if any, have only single mothers. In other instances, mothers are presented as "bad surrogates" eventually "punished for their misdeeds."[3] There is much debate about the reasoning behind this phenomenon.[4] In her thesis, Ashli Ann Sharp attempts to relate the phenomenon to traditional tales from the Grimms and Hans Christian Andersen, along with a lot of graduate school pop psychology.[5] Some[who?] allege that it comes from the guilt that Walt Disney had about the death of his own mother Flora Call Disney. Some feminists believe it is to create dramatic interest in the main characters; if mothers were present to guide them, they argue, there would not be much of a plot.[6] Some[who?] believe that it is to show that a happy family doesn't have to consist of a mother, father and a child and that a family can be one parent and one child (such as in Pocahontas) or one parent and many siblings (such as in The Little Mermaid).[7] Below is a list of some notable examples of this aspect of Disney movies and television series.[8]
Categories of mothers
- No (or 'absent') mothers.
- Pinocchio: Pinocchio - no mother[9]
- Beauty and the Beast: Belle - no mother.[10]
- Aladdin: Jasmine - no mother[11]
- Pocahontas: Pocahontas - no mother[12], but has a grandmother
- Stepmother
- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: the Queen.
- Cinderella: the Evil Stepmother.
- Mother is killed or captured
- The Hunchback of Notre Dame: Quasimodo - mother killed[13]
- The Little Mermaid: Ariel, Attina, Aquata, Andrina, Arista, Adella and Alana - Mother killed[14]
- Bambi: Bambi- mother killed.
- Mothers
- Dumbo- Jumbo.
- One Hundred and One Dalmatians- Perdita.
- Tarzan- Kala
- The Princess and the Frog- Eudora.
See also
References
- ^ Henry A. Giroux, Fugitive Cultures: Race, Violence, and Youth (Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, 1996).
- ^ Lynn H. Collins, Joan C. Chrisler, and Michelle R. Dunlap, Charting a New Course for Feminist Psychology (Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002), 94.
- ^ Stephen M. Fjellman, Vinyl Leaves: Walt Disney World and America (Westview Press, 1992), 263.
- ^ Aisha Sultan, "What does Disney have against mothers?," ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH (03/15/2008).
- ^ Ashli Ann Sharp, Once Upon a Time in a Single-parent Family: Father and Daughter Relationships in Disney's The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast (Brigham Young University, 2006).
- ^ Ask Amy
- ^ Geoff Shearer, "Disney keeps killing movie mothers: DISNEY is continuing its tradition of being G-rated entertainment's biggest mother flickers," Courier Mail (March 07, 2008).
- ^ Paul Loukides and Linda K. Fuller, Beyond the Stars: Themes and Ideologies in American Popular Film (Popular Press, 1993), 8.
- ^ Sara Munson Deats and Lagretta Tallent Lenker, Aging and Identity: A Humanities Perspective (Greenwood Publishing Group), 210.
- ^ Ashli Ann Sharp, Once Upon a Time in a Single-parent Family: Father and Daughter Relationships in Disney's The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast (Brigham Young University, 2006).
- ^ Sara Munson Deats and Lagretta Tallent Lenker, Aging and Identity: A Humanities Perspective (Greenwood Publishing Group), 210.
- ^ Sara Munson Deats and Lagretta Tallent Lenker, Aging and Identity: A Humanities Perspective (Greenwood Publishing Group), 210.
- ^ Sara Munson Deats and Lagretta Tallent Lenker, Aging and Identity: A Humanities Perspective (Greenwood Publishing Group), 210.
- ^ Ashli Ann Sharp, Once Upon a Time in a Single-parent Family: Father and Daughter Relationships in Disney's The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast (Brigham Young University, 2006).